Most Americans want immediate action on comprehensive immigration reform, new polling data revealed this week. A poll conducted by Lake Research Partners and Public Opinion Strategies found that more than three in four Americans from both major parties and in all geographic regions of the country support immigration reform.

After passage of Arizona's immigration law, which experts believe will promote racial profiling and overwhelm local police forces, many commentators have insisted that Americans are not in the mood for comprehensive immigration reform.

The results of this survey, however, showed that most people view the Arizona law as an unfortunate reaction to federal foot-dragging on reform. Instead of a punitive or enforcement-only response to immigration on the state or local level, Americans, including a significant majority of Latinos, want comprehensive federal action with four basic parts:

The poll found that of the people who support the Arizona law, most were likely to be white, male, Republican and supporters of the Tea Party. Others, however, who did not fit these categories say they support the law only out of frustration with the lack of federal action on comprehensive reform.

- Advertisement -

Opponents of the Arizona law said they believe the law will promote racial profiling and other un-Constitutional police measures, the survey found.

David Mermin, a pollster with Lake Research Partners, explained apart from extremist anti-immigrant sentiments, "the sense that the system is out of control and that there isn't a legal orderly process by which people are immigrating" drives most attitudes about immigration reform.

"The vast majority of Americans think we should still be welcoming immigrants," he said, "but they want that done in a legal way."

"Folks don't want some sort of draconian enforcement effort where you try to round up millions of people," Mermin added, "they want people to register, to get in line, to pay taxes, to learn English, to become American."

"You see enormous support for that approach to dealing with immigrants," he explained.

- Advertisement -

According to recent analysis published by the Immigration Policy Center, the economic contributions of undocumented immigrants far outweigh perceived costs of illegal immigration. According to that pro-reform group, in the state of Arizona alone, unauthorized immigrants add some $26.4 billion each year to the state's economy annually, including tax revenues and job-creating business activity.